ㅤ?CH01ㅤLOVE STORY ONE
ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤABOUTㅤ?ㅤAMOREㅤㅤㅤㅤLOVE STORY 01 OUT!CHAP
TER01
MATERIALITY
“amore will be great. amore will be a group unlike any other, with an unprecedented triple debut. they are destined for greatness.” the words of song jiseong echo in the depths of their minds.
historic. unparalleled. iconic.
cold.
january 28th, 2017; the day of amore’s debut stage, or rather, showcase as song jiseong pulled strings over at sbs. her all-ading influence gifted them with a sumptuous outdoor venue in gangwon.
the six of them stand inside the wings of the metal, high-tech precenium, in thin white dresses with ‘AMORE’ proudly proclaimed across their blooming chests. they huddle together for warmth and comfort, for security and calm. though they stand in wanton silence, their quivering muscles and dry mouths share their collective conscious.
over five hundred people fill up the seats in front of the stage, pulip points out with an iridescence to her, their murmurs making amore’s stomachs churn. the emcee for the event gives each individual member a flowery, frivolous introduction.
soon they will step out onto the stage, physically reveal themselves to the public as amore for the first time. when they cross the threshold of the wings, amore will actualize and there will finally be distinction between the material and the immaterial.
reira pinches the skin at , long and elegant eyes perforating the stage in front of them as the younger members play with the backstage camera. the elevated surface just feet away glimmers with quiet danger. or, something like that. it rained earlier, and reira remembers hyunjoo making a comment about bongju being at the showcase. the emcee wears a transparent raincoat as he drones on and on, reciting the script song jiseong created. she can only imagine the condition the stage is in.
song jiseong already pulled the leapfrog move from me gustas tu and—
“unnie,” mirae’s strong voice pulls reira from her thoughts, “luli wants to do a ‘positivity circle’.”
“is that so?” she looks over at lilian, who grabs jooyeon and hyunjoo’s hands.
“did you ever do anything like this the other times you debuted?”
reira remains silent, and before mirae can dismiss any implications, reira opens , “it's a theatre thing.”
they approach the rest of their children, all looking towards lilian for further instruction.
“okay! so, we all hold each other’s hands,” she locks fingers with jooyeon and everyone follows her example, “and we close our eyes,” they do, “and we all say something nice or what we’re feeling!”
after they go around sharing their hopes for a successful showcase, they shout a cheer. truthfully, they all shout nonsense because, really, only lilian wants to be shouting things in a circle, but life makes you do that sometimes. but, in the process of shouting nonsense in a circle, the six of them combine into one contingent particle.
in the short moments before they go onstage, there is no undercurrent of animosity or jealousy, only coalescence and connectivity.
“now ladies, gentlemen, and others, please welcome amore!”
the cheers are deafening as the girls walk out on stage one by one. lilian jumps at the volume, laughing at her own reaction as mirae’s hand urges her forward. jooyeon and pulip flap their arms in budding excitement. reira smiles at their exhilaration, giving them a small ‘fighting!’. they shoot finger hearts back at their leader. fans cheer louder at the fanservice.
hyunjoo beams the whole way out, pressing her hands to the round apples of her cheeks as people shout shin hyunjoo! shin hyunjoo!. her heart freezes, then pounds wildly against her chest as electricity surges through her veins.
this is it. this is what she danced for.
performed for.
fought for.
purged for.
lived for.
it's mirae who pulls her in close to the group as they all bow at the waist, “loving you forever! hello, we are amore!”
they get into position for their first song, mirae sliding into her space with sprezzatura. the ‘ding-dong, ding-dong’ of glass bead chimes through the high-definition speakers, amore’s stillness becoming a stream of continuity as they extend their legs after four fans of their hands.
reira was right. the stage is slippery like oil beneath their soles. a single move, and the girls find themselves on the verge of slipping. she slows her movement to keep an eye on the others. pulip and lilian wobble, the former lessening the effort she puts into her movements, while jooyeon grips lilian’s top whenever she felt unstable.
glass bead ends with no calamities. reira exhales. they shuffle into position for me gustas tu and she pats her members on the back, wordlessly urging them to be careful.
they make it through the modified intro. hyunjoo moves to the right wing of the formation and the wetness of her shoe mixed with the sleety half-ice concoction on the stage throws her onto the ground. the icy water slaps against her skin and fills her shoes. she gets up, because shin hyunjoo always will if it means she can prove herself, heart pounding against her aching chest like vibrational flows.
jooyeon sings about sending her heart with the wind, and the girls cross through the gaps of their formation. hyunjoo skids and catches herself.
she feels dizzy, nauseous, like the skin she’s trapped in is tightening around her and trying to kill her.
how can she call herself a dancer when she can’t even do this? when she can’t even dance on ice without skates, when she’s screwing up an entire performance for the group, when even lilian and that pulip can—
a hard, wet thud resounds on stage as lilian hits the ground, her microphone and head bouncing against the cold surface, her hair dripping. mirae and jooyeon stop to help her up, help her, and not hyunjoo when she fell. lilian, like a deer in headlights, bows to the crowd before reira pulls her into position.
jooyeon is the next one to lose and find her footing in the span of milliseconds.
the song is only halfway over, but all hyunjoo wanted was for it to end.
she can barely hear the backtrack through her earpiece, can barely hear the already faint singing of her members.
“stu ru, stu ru~”
bam! hyunjoo feels that one in her ankle. in her knees. in her bones. mirae pulls her up by the hand, entwining their fingers with a plastered-on smile that hides boiling anger. they push and pull one another, and as hyunjoo moves to the center for her part, mirae nearly falls. she laughs it off.
reira does not. reira will not. reira does not laugh or smile at all, in fact.
the song moves into its final chorus, and reira stands in the very center of the formation to belt out her high notes. she moves back, and hyunjoo places her left foot on the ground to ease the formation change, but her ankle can’t handle the vigor and her own weight any longer. she falls.
reira ceases all movement and pulls hyunjoo up just as she tries curling up on the floor. she bites her cheek as hot, pregnant tears threaten to fall from hyunjoo’s flushed face.
get through these last forty seconds, hyunjoo. reira’s eyes say, burning with the heat of molten steel, as they look at her vitamin.
hyunjoo isn’t sure how the did it, and neither is reira. hell, none of them know how they survived that show. there’s a ringing in hyunjoo’s ears, dulling the shouts of it’s okay, it’s okay! from the crowd. before the emcee can even speak, raira drags hyunjoo off the stage.
seeing the way reira forces hyunjoo offstage, mirae just knows there’s a volcano threatening to burst beneath reira’s watery surface. she stops the other members from bowing ( and doing aegyo, in jooyeon’s case ) and directs them off stage.
the cheers of sympathy, cheers of pity, grow louder and louder as amore retreats backstage to their wounds. mirae bumps into the back of lilian’s head, placing her chic fingers on the girl’s shoulder.
“what’s wrong?” she whispers.
“unnie, i’m like, really dizzy.”
mirae seizes her wrist and helps her from the stage.
medical staff, the other amore members, and song jiseong herself surround hyunjoo. one of the medical staff members touch her ankle, and hyunjoo swallows the wince that rises from the back of . she can’t let song jiseong see weakness, see that she is… incompetent.
just thinking of the word makes hyunjoo’s body feel like its breaking. makes her want to punish herself. starve herself.
“it’s swollen, alright.” song jiseong murmurs.
“miss president!” hyunjoo blurts out as she fights through the marked feeling of being , “i’m fine, it’s nothing serious—”
“you’re a dancer, hyunjoo. don’t ruin your career by forcing your ankle before it heals.” she smiles. at hyunjoo. song jiseong smiles at shin hyunjoo, and even if for an iota, shin hyunjoo is ontic.
this shouldn’t have happened. reira fumes as her jaw clenches.
mirae’s voice distracts reira from the coiling heat in her stomach, “miss president, this shouldn’t have happened.” her voice is pointed, “luli got hurt too.”
and with the widening of song jiseong’s eyes, her undivided attention shifts from hyunjoo to lilian, “nayoung too?”
“and she wouldn’t have if the condition of the stage was checked! why would you let us go out like that and get hurt?”
the girls go hush as mirae voices the elephant in the room. reira tenses up at hyunjoo’s side, still as a manmade construct. the back of aches. she loves song jiseong, adores the woman and yet… “what’s wrong with nayoung?” reira asks.
“thank you morioka,” she wants to smile but she can’t, “right now the most important thing is making sure all of you are alright, and if not, that you’re being treated for your injuries. enough of the blame game, adrienne.”
song jiseong beckons lilian away from jooyeon. she’s barely able to walk in a straight line without wobbling. she asks how lilian feels, eyebrows drawing together as she rubs lilian’s head.
“i have a headache,” lilian says, squinting and widening her eyes to focus on her boss, “and i feel really sick.”
“nayoung, don’t slur your words,” she wants to roll her eyes at song jiseong’s nagging, but her head pounds when she tries, “did you hit your head when you fell?”
“i… don’t remember?”
“what do you remember?”
“going on stage, and falling, and then coming back here.”
song jiseong rubs a hand up her stiff neck with a sigh. she looks far off, past amore, past all her worldly knowledge, past her perceptual range.
“um… ma’am?” the stage manager calls out, “miss song?”
“hm? oh, sorry, my thoughts were elsewhere.”
“what would you like us to do about the rest of the showcase?”
“cancel it.”
“er—are you sure?”
“nayoung’s in no shape to continue performing,” she adds on, “neither is hyunjoo.” hyunjoo pinches the back of her thighs as she struggles to fight her wet eyes and congested sinuses. “are the rest of you injured?” no one answers, “well? are you?”
“no ma’am.” reira says, and hyunjoo curses herself. if she was better. if she was better—
“good. manager kwon,” amore’s all-to-serious manager approaches the ceo’s side, “take the girls back to the dorm and make sure they get rest.” he nods curtly, “nayoung is coming with me.”
the question lingers on hyunjoo’s lips. why lilian and not her? but the answer also lingers on her lips. and pulip’s and mirae’s and reira’s and jooyeon’s.
manager serious directs the girls to the van, where fans outside see them and shout, “it was hard, wasn’t it?”, “amore fighting!”, and “you’ve done well!”. song jiseong and lilian loop around the back to her personal vehicle.
lilian walks by song jiseong’s side, head down and a thickness in . she wants to be with the others, wants to make sure her vitamin-unnie is alright, wants to hug jooyeon until her head stops hurting, wants to be babied by reira and mirae. she gives the opposite direction on last look before getting inside song jiseong’s car.
manager serious helps hyunjoo inside, her arm over his broad shoulders, leading her to amore’s spacious couch. he pulls reira to the side, both of them speaking in small voices as jooyeon and pulip plop onto the floor and turn on the tv.
mirae places hyunjoo’s sprained ankle on a throw pillow, smoothing her hair, “mirae-unnie…”
“keep your foot elevated.” mirae says, “i’ll get some ice and we can wrap it up, alright?”
hyunjoo nods, “i’m… sorry i ruined our debut showcase.”
“at least it was you and not me,” pulip turns to face hyunjoo before getting nudged in the rib by jooyeon’s pointy elbow, “what? jiseong would’ve had my head if it were me.”
mirae sighs, lips pressed together in a thin line at pulip’s propensity to not say the right things. “it’s not your fault hyunjoo. the stage should have been checked and cleared off so we could dance safely. right, manager kwon?”
a dangerous, impetuous kind of politeness lace her words, internalizing anger because manager serious is older and in charge of them. but management’s ineptitude leaves amore with two injured members and most likely soiled their good name.
he looks towards mirae with a gaze softer than usual, “i apologize, mirae-ah.” if those are his true feelings, then only a fraction of them break through his stone face. “the stage manager is typically in charge of stuff like that, but they only do one check before the show starts.”
“this isn’t anyone’s fault,” reira offers the two of them a sad smile, “we can’t control the weather.”
mirae turns back tro hyunjoo, and manager serious bids the girls farewell with encouragements to rest well. he heads to the entrance of their dorm and lingers. “and hyunjoo-ah?”
her ears perk up, “yes manager seri—manager kwon?”
“i’m proud of you,” he smiles, “you have worked very hard and did your best. goodnight.”
“goodnight manager kwon.”
thick silence permeates the air, a collective unconscious of regret and frustration flowing through them.
“should we practice?” reira asks. pulip whines immediately.
“do we have to, reira-unnie?” jooyeon says.
“yeah, it might make hyunjoo feel left out.”
“yah, jung pulip!” hyunjoo exclaims from her spot on the couch, “be concerned about yourself and not me! you would benefit from more practice.” her muscles grow rigid as her words grow exponentially more stilted, “the only reason you didn’t fall was because you weren’t even trying to dance properly!”
pulip looks towards her again, and jooyeon rolls her eyes in defense of pulip. both of them giggle to themselves, which only makes hyunjoo grind her teeth.
“forget i asked,” reira sighs, “let’s just eat and relax, alright?”
“but it’s luli’s turn to make dinner.”
and like a hollywood actress following her cues, lilian jung opens the front door with song jiseong by her side. the smell of pork skewers and spicy braised chicken fills the air as lilian waves two greasy paper bags around.
song jiseong turns towards reira, “nayoung has a concussion. try not to let her sit on her laptop, the screen will make it worse.” reira nods before jiseong whips her head in hyunjoo’s direction, “i managed to push back your music show debut for two weeks, think you can recover in that time, hyunjoo?”
hyunjoo wrings her hands, fingers running over her dry and cut knuckles, “yes ma’am.”
she bites her bottom lip, insides quivering. she has to recover quickly, she has to. she has to redeem herself to song jiseong, she has to. her conscious wants to become matter, to break free of the innateness of her mind’s field.
“i know you can, because you’re our hyunjoo.” and with that, she says goodnight to everyone.
lilian places the bags of food on the wooden table, shoulders shimmying at the thought of filling her stomach with greasy food. she fixes a plate for hyunjoo and brings it over to her. “miss jiseong wanted to take me out to eat,” she says as she hugs hyunjoo’s head, “but i wanted to eat with you guys, so i convinced her to buy us pork skewers and spicy braised chicken!”
“luli!” hyunjoo says with a lilted whine of appreciation, “we should be watching our diets!” she shoots a look over at pulip, who already has one of the pork skewers inside .
“but everyone knows food like this makes you feel better when you’re sad, unnie!”
hyunjoo smiles, squeezing the apples of her cheeks as she thanks lilian.
food like this?
they eat, the meat and the sauce like a quantum bond, a diffuse attachment between the six of them. the eat, rubbing each other’s backs as they surrender to the indeterminate memory that is their debut stage, a collective resignation. the pork skewers and spicy braised chicken is temporarily polyvalent within them.
but, the self maintains. they maintain. amore maintains.
historic. unparalleled. iconic.
cold.
january 28th, 2017; the day of amore’s debut stage, or rather, showcase as song jiseong pulled strings over at sbs. her all-ading influence gifted them with a sumptuous outdoor venue in gangwon.
the six of them stand inside the wings of the metal, high-tech precenium, in thin white dresses with ‘AMORE’ proudly proclaimed across their blooming chests. they huddle together for warmth and comfort, for security and calm. though they stand in wanton silence, their quivering muscles and dry mouths share their collective conscious.
over five hundred people fill up the seats in front of the stage, pulip points out with an iridescence to her, their murmurs making amore’s stomachs churn. the emcee for the event gives each individual member a flowery, frivolous introduction.
soon they will step out onto the stage, physically reveal themselves to the public as amore for the first time. when they cross the threshold of the wings, amore will actualize and there will finally be distinction between the material and the immaterial.
reira pinches the skin at , long and elegant eyes perforating the stage in front of them as the younger members play with the backstage camera. the elevated surface just feet away glimmers with quiet danger. or, something like that. it rained earlier, and reira remembers hyunjoo making a comment about bongju being at the showcase. the emcee wears a transparent raincoat as he drones on and on, reciting the script song jiseong created. she can only imagine the condition the stage is in.
song jiseong already pulled the leapfrog move from me gustas tu and—
“unnie,” mirae’s strong voice pulls reira from her thoughts, “luli wants to do a ‘positivity circle’.”
“is that so?” she looks over at lilian, who grabs jooyeon and hyunjoo’s hands.
“did you ever do anything like this the other times you debuted?”
reira remains silent, and before mirae can dismiss any implications, reira opens , “it's a theatre thing.”
they approach the rest of their children, all looking towards lilian for further instruction.
“okay! so, we all hold each other’s hands,” she locks fingers with jooyeon and everyone follows her example, “and we close our eyes,” they do, “and we all say something nice or what we’re feeling!”
after they go around sharing their hopes for a successful showcase, they shout a cheer. truthfully, they all shout nonsense because, really, only lilian wants to be shouting things in a circle, but life makes you do that sometimes. but, in the process of shouting nonsense in a circle, the six of them combine into one contingent particle.
in the short moments before they go onstage, there is no undercurrent of animosity or jealousy, only coalescence and connectivity.
“now ladies, gentlemen, and others, please welcome amore!”
the cheers are deafening as the girls walk out on stage one by one. lilian jumps at the volume, laughing at her own reaction as mirae’s hand urges her forward. jooyeon and pulip flap their arms in budding excitement. reira smiles at their exhilaration, giving them a small ‘fighting!’. they shoot finger hearts back at their leader. fans cheer louder at the fanservice.
hyunjoo beams the whole way out, pressing her hands to the round apples of her cheeks as people shout shin hyunjoo! shin hyunjoo!. her heart freezes, then pounds wildly against her chest as electricity surges through her veins.
this is it. this is what she danced for.
performed for.
fought for.
purged for.
lived for.
it's mirae who pulls her in close to the group as they all bow at the waist, “loving you forever! hello, we are amore!”
they get into position for their first song, mirae sliding into her space with sprezzatura. the ‘ding-dong, ding-dong’ of glass bead chimes through the high-definition speakers, amore’s stillness becoming a stream of continuity as they extend their legs after four fans of their hands.
reira was right. the stage is slippery like oil beneath their soles. a single move, and the girls find themselves on the verge of slipping. she slows her movement to keep an eye on the others. pulip and lilian wobble, the former lessening the effort she puts into her movements, while jooyeon grips lilian’s top whenever she felt unstable.
glass bead ends with no calamities. reira exhales. they shuffle into position for me gustas tu and she pats her members on the back, wordlessly urging them to be careful.
they make it through the modified intro. hyunjoo moves to the right wing of the formation and the wetness of her shoe mixed with the sleety half-ice concoction on the stage throws her onto the ground. the icy water slaps against her skin and fills her shoes. she gets up, because shin hyunjoo always will if it means she can prove herself, heart pounding against her aching chest like vibrational flows.
jooyeon sings about sending her heart with the wind, and the girls cross through the gaps of their formation. hyunjoo skids and catches herself.
she feels dizzy, nauseous, like the skin she’s trapped in is tightening around her and trying to kill her.
how can she call herself a dancer when she can’t even do this? when she can’t even dance on ice without skates, when she’s screwing up an entire performance for the group, when even lilian and that pulip can—
a hard, wet thud resounds on stage as lilian hits the ground, her microphone and head bouncing against the cold surface, her hair dripping. mirae and jooyeon stop to help her up, help her, and not hyunjoo when she fell. lilian, like a deer in headlights, bows to the crowd before reira pulls her into position.
jooyeon is the next one to lose and find her footing in the span of milliseconds.
the song is only halfway over, but all hyunjoo wanted was for it to end.
she can barely hear the backtrack through her earpiece, can barely hear the already faint singing of her members.
“stu ru, stu ru~”
bam! hyunjoo feels that one in her ankle. in her knees. in her bones. mirae pulls her up by the hand, entwining their fingers with a plastered-on smile that hides boiling anger. they push and pull one another, and as hyunjoo moves to the center for her part, mirae nearly falls. she laughs it off.
reira does not. reira will not. reira does not laugh or smile at all, in fact.
the song moves into its final chorus, and reira stands in the very center of the formation to belt out her high notes. she moves back, and hyunjoo places her left foot on the ground to ease the formation change, but her ankle can’t handle the vigor and her own weight any longer. she falls.
reira ceases all movement and pulls hyunjoo up just as she tries curling up on the floor. she bites her cheek as hot, pregnant tears threaten to fall from hyunjoo’s flushed face.
get through these last forty seconds, hyunjoo. reira’s eyes say, burning with the heat of molten steel, as they look at her vitamin.
hyunjoo isn’t sure how the did it, and neither is reira. hell, none of them know how they survived that show. there’s a ringing in hyunjoo’s ears, dulling the shouts of it’s okay, it’s okay! from the crowd. before the emcee can even speak, raira drags hyunjoo off the stage.
seeing the way reira forces hyunjoo offstage, mirae just knows there’s a volcano threatening to burst beneath reira’s watery surface. she stops the other members from bowing ( and doing aegyo, in jooyeon’s case ) and directs them off stage.
the cheers of sympathy, cheers of pity, grow louder and louder as amore retreats backstage to their wounds. mirae bumps into the back of lilian’s head, placing her chic fingers on the girl’s shoulder.
“what’s wrong?” she whispers.
“unnie, i’m like, really dizzy.”
mirae seizes her wrist and helps her from the stage.
medical staff, the other amore members, and song jiseong herself surround hyunjoo. one of the medical staff members touch her ankle, and hyunjoo swallows the wince that rises from the back of . she can’t let song jiseong see weakness, see that she is… incompetent.
just thinking of the word makes hyunjoo’s body feel like its breaking. makes her want to punish herself. starve herself.
“it’s swollen, alright.” song jiseong murmurs.
“miss president!” hyunjoo blurts out as she fights through the marked feeling of being , “i’m fine, it’s nothing serious—”
“you’re a dancer, hyunjoo. don’t ruin your career by forcing your ankle before it heals.” she smiles. at hyunjoo. song jiseong smiles at shin hyunjoo, and even if for an iota, shin hyunjoo is ontic.
this shouldn’t have happened. reira fumes as her jaw clenches.
mirae’s voice distracts reira from the coiling heat in her stomach, “miss president, this shouldn’t have happened.” her voice is pointed, “luli got hurt too.”
and with the widening of song jiseong’s eyes, her undivided attention shifts from hyunjoo to lilian, “nayoung too?”
“and she wouldn’t have if the condition of the stage was checked! why would you let us go out like that and get hurt?”
the girls go hush as mirae voices the elephant in the room. reira tenses up at hyunjoo’s side, still as a manmade construct. the back of aches. she loves song jiseong, adores the woman and yet… “what’s wrong with nayoung?” reira asks.
“thank you morioka,” she wants to smile but she can’t, “right now the most important thing is making sure all of you are alright, and if not, that you’re being treated for your injuries. enough of the blame game, adrienne.”
song jiseong beckons lilian away from jooyeon. she’s barely able to walk in a straight line without wobbling. she asks how lilian feels, eyebrows drawing together as she rubs lilian’s head.
“i have a headache,” lilian says, squinting and widening her eyes to focus on her boss, “and i feel really sick.”
“nayoung, don’t slur your words,” she wants to roll her eyes at song jiseong’s nagging, but her head pounds when she tries, “did you hit your head when you fell?”
“i… don’t remember?”
“what do you remember?”
“going on stage, and falling, and then coming back here.”
song jiseong rubs a hand up her stiff neck with a sigh. she looks far off, past amore, past all her worldly knowledge, past her perceptual range.
“um… ma’am?” the stage manager calls out, “miss song?”
“hm? oh, sorry, my thoughts were elsewhere.”
“what would you like us to do about the rest of the showcase?”
“cancel it.”
“er—are you sure?”
“nayoung’s in no shape to continue performing,” she adds on, “neither is hyunjoo.” hyunjoo pinches the back of her thighs as she struggles to fight her wet eyes and congested sinuses. “are the rest of you injured?” no one answers, “well? are you?”
“no ma’am.” reira says, and hyunjoo curses herself. if she was better. if she was better—
“good. manager kwon,” amore’s all-to-serious manager approaches the ceo’s side, “take the girls back to the dorm and make sure they get rest.” he nods curtly, “nayoung is coming with me.”
the question lingers on hyunjoo’s lips. why lilian and not her? but the answer also lingers on her lips. and pulip’s and mirae’s and reira’s and jooyeon’s.
manager serious directs the girls to the van, where fans outside see them and shout, “it was hard, wasn’t it?”, “amore fighting!”, and “you’ve done well!”. song jiseong and lilian loop around the back to her personal vehicle.
lilian walks by song jiseong’s side, head down and a thickness in . she wants to be with the others, wants to make sure her vitamin-unnie is alright, wants to hug jooyeon until her head stops hurting, wants to be babied by reira and mirae. she gives the opposite direction on last look before getting inside song jiseong’s car.
manager serious helps hyunjoo inside, her arm over his broad shoulders, leading her to amore’s spacious couch. he pulls reira to the side, both of them speaking in small voices as jooyeon and pulip plop onto the floor and turn on the tv.
mirae places hyunjoo’s sprained ankle on a throw pillow, smoothing her hair, “mirae-unnie…”
“keep your foot elevated.” mirae says, “i’ll get some ice and we can wrap it up, alright?”
hyunjoo nods, “i’m… sorry i ruined our debut showcase.”
“at least it was you and not me,” pulip turns to face hyunjoo before getting nudged in the rib by jooyeon’s pointy elbow, “what? jiseong would’ve had my head if it were me.”
mirae sighs, lips pressed together in a thin line at pulip’s propensity to not say the right things. “it’s not your fault hyunjoo. the stage should have been checked and cleared off so we could dance safely. right, manager kwon?”
a dangerous, impetuous kind of politeness lace her words, internalizing anger because manager serious is older and in charge of them. but management’s ineptitude leaves amore with two injured members and most likely soiled their good name.
he looks towards mirae with a gaze softer than usual, “i apologize, mirae-ah.” if those are his true feelings, then only a fraction of them break through his stone face. “the stage manager is typically in charge of stuff like that, but they only do one check before the show starts.”
“this isn’t anyone’s fault,” reira offers the two of them a sad smile, “we can’t control the weather.”
mirae turns back tro hyunjoo, and manager serious bids the girls farewell with encouragements to rest well. he heads to the entrance of their dorm and lingers. “and hyunjoo-ah?”
her ears perk up, “yes manager seri—manager kwon?”
“i’m proud of you,” he smiles, “you have worked very hard and did your best. goodnight.”
“goodnight manager kwon.”
thick silence permeates the air, a collective unconscious of regret and frustration flowing through them.
“should we practice?” reira asks. pulip whines immediately.
“do we have to, reira-unnie?” jooyeon says.
“yeah, it might make hyunjoo feel left out.”
“yah, jung pulip!” hyunjoo exclaims from her spot on the couch, “be concerned about yourself and not me! you would benefit from more practice.” her muscles grow rigid as her words grow exponentially more stilted, “the only reason you didn’t fall was because you weren’t even trying to dance properly!”
pulip looks towards her again, and jooyeon rolls her eyes in defense of pulip. both of them giggle to themselves, which only makes hyunjoo grind her teeth.
“forget i asked,” reira sighs, “let’s just eat and relax, alright?”
“but it’s luli’s turn to make dinner.”
and like a hollywood actress following her cues, lilian jung opens the front door with song jiseong by her side. the smell of pork skewers and spicy braised chicken fills the air as lilian waves two greasy paper bags around.
song jiseong turns towards reira, “nayoung has a concussion. try not to let her sit on her laptop, the screen will make it worse.” reira nods before jiseong whips her head in hyunjoo’s direction, “i managed to push back your music show debut for two weeks, think you can recover in that time, hyunjoo?”
hyunjoo wrings her hands, fingers running over her dry and cut knuckles, “yes ma’am.”
she bites her bottom lip, insides quivering. she has to recover quickly, she has to. she has to redeem herself to song jiseong, she has to. her conscious wants to become matter, to break free of the innateness of her mind’s field.
“i know you can, because you’re our hyunjoo.” and with that, she says goodnight to everyone.
lilian places the bags of food on the wooden table, shoulders shimmying at the thought of filling her stomach with greasy food. she fixes a plate for hyunjoo and brings it over to her. “miss jiseong wanted to take me out to eat,” she says as she hugs hyunjoo’s head, “but i wanted to eat with you guys, so i convinced her to buy us pork skewers and spicy braised chicken!”
“luli!” hyunjoo says with a lilted whine of appreciation, “we should be watching our diets!” she shoots a look over at pulip, who already has one of the pork skewers inside .
“but everyone knows food like this makes you feel better when you’re sad, unnie!”
hyunjoo smiles, squeezing the apples of her cheeks as she thanks lilian.
food like this?
they eat, the meat and the sauce like a quantum bond, a diffuse attachment between the six of them. the eat, rubbing each other’s backs as they surrender to the indeterminate memory that is their debut stage, a collective resignation. the pork skewers and spicy braised chicken is temporarily polyvalent within them.
but, the self maintains. they maintain. amore maintains.
Like this story? Give it an
Upvote!
Thank you!
Comments